Florida House members are considering cutting funding for programs that supply patients with a powerful addiction-fighting drug.

A Jacksonville addiction specialist says that move could make it harder to stem the opioid epidemic.

Vivitrol helps people addicted to heroin or opioid pills by blocking brain receptors. Unlike some opioid addiction medications, it doesn’t help patients with pain. It only helps stem cravings. The most effective version is a once-monthly injection that addicts can receive on the way out of rehab or jail.

The House budget proposal would cut millions of dollars for those programs.

Dr. Raymond Pomm is a Jacksonville addiction specialist leading a treatment pilot program at St. Vincent’s Riverside hospital.

“We need all the tools available to us to combat this epidemic, not start cutting back. In fact, there’s not enough money out there for services,” he said. “We’ve known that for quite a while, and to start reducing what little money there is — actually, I just can’t wrap my brain around it.”

House Health and Criminal Justice budget chairs are proposing a total funding cut for Vivitrol programs of $7 million, more than $5 million of which comes from corrections programs, while the remainder comes from partially state-funded community treatment programs.

On the other hand, state lawmakers are proposing $50 million to combat opioid addiction, and according to the News Service of Florida, that includes some medication-assisted programs.

Still, Pomm said, treatment would be less effective without Vivitrol.

“They already have that clean time. Giving them that injection just before discharge gives them a huge buffer, and [it’s] a preventative measure from using opioids again, and, again, saving lives,” he said.

Calls to House and Senate budget chairs were not returned by this story’s deadline.

Ryan Benk can be reached at rbenk@wjct.org, 904-358-6319 or on Twitter at @RyanMichaelBenk.

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Researchers who compared the two drugs found them equally effective once treatment started. But there are fundamental differences in the way treatment begins, which makes these findings difficult to interpret.

Philip Kirby says he first used heroin during a stint in a halfway house a few years ago, when he was 21 years old. He quickly formed a habit.

"You can't really dabble in it," he says.

Late last year, Kirby was driving with drugs and a syringe in his car when he got pulled over. He went to jail for a few months on a separate charge before entering a drug court program in Hamilton County, Ind., north of Indianapolis. But before Kirby started, he says the court pressured him to get a shot of a drug called Vivitrol.

Two years ago, a mental health advocate named Steve McCaffrey stood at a lectern in the Indiana statehouse, testifying in favor of an addiction treatment bill. After years of rising overdose rates, lawmakers in the health committee were taking action to combat the opioid epidemic. And they often turned to McCaffrey, who leads Mental Health America of Indiana, to advise them.

His brief testimony appeared straightforward. "We rise in support, urge your adoption," said McCaffrey. He said the legislation would move the state "toward evidence-based treatment."

The nation-wide opioid epidemic is getting worse. According to Florida's Department of Law Enforcement, there were nearly 6,000 opioid-related deaths in our state in 2016--a 35 percent increase from 2015. While there is no single solution, Naples' David Lawrence Center is using a grant to use a different approach to combat the problem.